Mystery Hooker
by Lady Starhawk
Summary: It's crochet dammitt! Someone is leaving gifts for the team.


Title: Mystery Hooker

Author: Lady Starhawk

Rating: T (One swear word purposely misspelled)

Pairing: Nope (friendship only, so I don't consider that a pairing)

Summary: It's crochet dammitt! Someone is leaving gifts for the team.

Note: Serenelystrange for encouraging me :)

It started out small.

Sophie mentioned after one job early in November that her hands were cold. It was a crisp day, and they continued on the con like nothing had happened. A few days later she opened up her purse to find a pair of hand-made white soft and fluffy mittens. There was a small tag inside with washing instructions, but nothing more. Sophie wasn't sure who had made them for her, but she wore them every chilly day from then on.

Parker mentioned a week, or so, later that the heating in her house wasn't working well. Hardison went over and helped her fix it. But two weeks later she came home from a job to find an afghan on her bed. It was the color of money, and was very soft and warm. Parker didn't miss a beat, she snuggled under the blankets, the smell was familiar, but she couldn't place it. She wasn't woken up in the middle of the night by the cold again.

Nate had caught himself laryngitis, and a few days later a scarf was hanging from the back of his closet door. Hardison had been mentioning that his hands were getting cold as he hacked in the van, and a week later fingerless gloves appeared on the top of his keyboard as he slept.

Little things continued to appear, hats, scarves, mittens, and bags. Not all the time, and never more than once a week. Nobody really thought much about it, until one day Parker came bouncing into Nate's apartment wearing a bright pink hat and a pair of mittens.

"Look Sophie," the thief started, "The knitting fairy brought me a hat, and mittens with special slits in them so I can get my fingers out. See?" She proceeded to demonstrate the mittens unique design.

"They're Lovely Parker." She moved to take another sip of her tea and stopped half way to her mouth, "I'm sorry, the who brought you them?"

"The knitting fairy." Parker said as she moved her fingers in and out of the mittens, getting the feel for the soft, slick fabric.

"There's no such thing as a knitting fairy Parker."

"There is so. Over the last couple of months all kinds of things have been appearing for all of us. They've even appeared in places that only a thief can get into. So, it has to be the knitting fairy."

Hardison perked up at this, "She's got a point Soph. I've gotten a few things since winter started, and I know I have seen some knitted items on you too." Hardison smiled, "You have to be curious as to where these things are coming from."

Sophie nodded, "I have thought about it. But I don't know anybody who knits."

Nate piped up from where he and Eliot were watching a football game. "My grandmother knitted when she was still alive."

Parker perked up at that "Maybe it's her ghost knitting us stuff from beyond the grave?"

"I doubt that Parker." Nate looked thoughtful for a moment, "I wonder who has the skills to knit, as well as break in to our homes and plant items while we're sleeping."

"I wonder what the knitting fairy will make for us next?" Parker asked in wide-eyed wonder.

"Hey Eliot? What's the phantom knitter made for you?" Hardison called to the hitter who was absorbed in the game.

"Nothing."

"What do you mean nothing?"

"I mean I haven't been given anything. Now shut up Hardison, I'm trying to watch the game." He took a long draw from his beer and turned back to the tvs.

Parker looked sad, "Is the knitting fairy like Santa, does she only knit items for good people? Eliot's a good person, why doesn't he get visited by the knitting fairy?"

Nobody noticed the vein in Eliot's forehead start to throb. If they had they might have changed the subject.

"Maybe crabby pissy rednecks don't get knitted stuff from a mystery person because they are crabby and pissy adnd on't deserve nice warm knitted stuff." Hardison said with a smirk.

Eliot slammed his beer down. "It's crochet."

Everybody stopped what they were doing and stared at him. Angry Eliot was a bad thing.

"Excuse me?" Hardison said looking to Nate to figure out how to play this.

"It's crochet damnitt!" Eliot growled, stood, and started for the door.

Nate intercepted him, "Hold on Eliot."

"Nate, either you move outta my way, or I will MOVE you."

Nate backed off and let the angry hitter leave.

"Eliot crochets?" Sophie asked fingering the delicate silk net scarf she was wearing, apparently made by Eliot.

"Yeah" Nate said shrugging. "Not like he shares his leisure activities with the rest of us. How was I supposed to know that Eliot crocheted?"

"Oh my God." Hardison started laughing, "Crocheting's for little old ladies. I can't believe Eliot does it."

"You enjoyed your gloves and hat and things enough when you didn't know where they came from. Why does it matter if Eliot crochets?" Nate said with a disapproving look on his face.

Sophie stood and nodded, "It makes sense, in a way. Eliot has a lot of energy and needs to keep himself under control. Having a hobby where he can do repetitive movements, but end up with a useful item at the end isn't all that far-fetched. Like chopping the vegetables when he cooks."

"Still it's probably the most girly thing I can think of our big bad hitter doing." Hardison kept chuckling under his breath as he got back to work.

Nobody noticed Parker sneak out the back.

Eliot got home without incident. He knew that the team would find out eventually, but he had hoped to keep his secret a little longer.

"Why?" Eliot almost jumped, but he smelled her shampoo a second before she spoke.

"Why what Parker?"

"Why do you keep it a secret?"

"It's not something normal men do."

He saw the reflection of Parker in the window, she had sat down in his couch and picked up his yarn basket. "You're not normal though. You're Eliot."

He chuckled, leave it to the blonde thief to see the world so simply. "True. But it's not something that I think the world needs to know about me."

She nodded, and started rummaging around in the basket. "Why do you do it?"

He sighed and sat down on the other end of the couch. She wasn't laughing at him, so maybe he can talk to her about this. "I started doing it again when I was too busted up from a job to do my Thai chi. It's rhythmic and soothing to me. Something that helps me cut out distractions and focus. Then I saw an organization that collects crocheted and knitted hats scarves and mittens for families that can't afford them. So I started making things for them. Then Sophie mentioned she was cold, and it just went from there."

Parker smiled and held up a tiny hat that looked kind of like a strawberry. "How did you learn?"

"My grandmother taught me when I was little. I broke my leg, and was bored outta my skull because I couldn't' play. I must have driven my mother crazy because my grandmother came in one day with a box of hooks and balls of yarn and taught me."

Parker looked at him with a hook in one hand and a ball of yarn in the other, "Can you teach me?"

Eliot smiled, "Of course."

A few hours later Parker had mastered some of the basic stitches and was working on a really nice scarf. She looked up and said, "So you're really the knitting fairy?"

Eliot sighed and kept watching what she was doing "I don't knit Parker, I crochet."

"So you're the Mystery Hooker?"

He shook his head "There's something wrong with you. Now, yarn over one more time and pull all the loops through."

Note: Some crocheters refer to themselves as "hookers" because they use a hook. Those people tend to refer to knitters as stickers, because of the stick they use. I happen to crochet (not knit) but do not refer to myself as a hooker.

Further note: I know quite a few men who knit and crochet. In the circles I run in it's acceptable. For most men in America, there's still a stigma. This is not my opinion, but the opinion of the men I hang out with. I mean no disrespect.


End file.
